


The Simple Facts

by nikatsu



Series: Polar Opposites Attract (A Changmin x YoonA collection) [5]
Category: DBSK | Tohoshinki | TVfXQ | TVXQ, So Nyuh Shi Dae | Girls' Generation
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-19
Updated: 2011-11-19
Packaged: 2018-01-11 21:27:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1178118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nikatsu/pseuds/nikatsu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Changmin knows a few facts still ring true.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Simple Facts

**Fact:** _Shim Changmin receives a note every morning._

The notes, written on crisp white post-it notes, are stuck to his locker every morning when he arrives to rehearse. They are filled with uplifting quotes and smiles all over, hinting on a courage the writer knew was still within him – hidden somewhere underneath all his sadness. The notes are never signed with a name but with a heart, and Changmin doesn’t really need to guess who they’re from to know why they were sent. But instead of making him feel better, these white notes only deliver a burden in his heart.

Still, he picks them off every morning like clockwork before anyone can see and puts them into his pocket.

* * *

The new kids bring him food every break, clamoring for his attention and approval that it makes him a little sick. Changmin doesn’t think he’s much of an inspiration – Yunho is, he’s the leader of their… team – but he tried not to come off as too much of a snob for the young hopefuls. He’d been in their position once, practicing day in and out to gain a nod from the seniors in the company and so he knew how important it was to be civil.

Although a bit disheartened, Changmin encourages the trainee in front of him – telling him stories of his training days and quoting past seniors that had come and gone in the past years. He tells him about the times he spent singing his heart out at practices with the friends he met the same year he entered, and vaguely noticed the sight of soft brown waves passing by.

His nose twitches. She smells like peaches and cream, like always.

“Ah, Yoona-noona!” The new boy cries, turning his short attention from him to the doe-eyed girl walking a few steps ahead. She turns to the sound of her name and grins, although it seems as though the smile is more to him than to the trainee who called her.

His stomach decides to spin at the moment and Changmin thought it was best a time to leave.

* * *

**Fact:** _He hates how she looks at him._

He hates that her eyes are bright and caring; patient even while he slips past her (ignoring her) time and time again.

Yoona is too nice for her own good, too naïve. She gives her trust too easily and it suffocates him because he cannot do the same.

* * *

He caught her writing down on a post-it note one morning and took a step back.

There’s a look of concentration on her face while her pen moved gently across the paper’s surface. The light overhead glares down at her mercilessly, giving off odd shadows on her face while she wrote. She smiled a little bit once she finished, pressing the paper onto the metal surface of his locker with a soft giggle and a sigh.

She didn’t notice him standing outside the door as she tiptoed out of the room and made her exit. He didn’t expect her to.

Actually…

He didn’t want her to.

* * *

**Fact:** _They used to be friends once._

Real friends.

The type of friends who called and texted each other every day and night just to see how the other is doing even though technically they were in the same room together. Changmin used to call her ‘Yoong’ as easily as she used to call him ‘Oppa’. They used to be so close it was, at some point, difficult to identify the line that blurred between friendship and love.

But things were different now.

Maybe it was just the natural way of things. People meet and drift apart everyday; and they were just one of those who were a part of the natural flow of life.

Still, the notes are pasted on everyday, and Changmin and Yoona go on with their lives as though nothing has changed.

* * *

“You’re avoiding me as always.”

“Am I? I didn’t notice.”

Yoona grins, but there’s an edge in it that throws him just a bit off balance.

“It’s okay. I’m used to it.”

Changmin holds back from saying anymore as she skips off to practice.

“You’re not supposed to.”

* * *

**Fact:** _There are so many other girls prettier than Im Yoona._

And he knew exactly who that person was…

Victoria’s really pretty. And really friendly. His ideal type. His dream personified.

He finds himself smiling more around his best friend’s beautiful best ‘girl’ friend and the fact alone doesn’t bother him one bit. He might have met her earlier if it weren’t for Kyuhyun’s annoying way of scheduling meet-ups when he’s out of the country, but that didn’t matter anymore. Fact is, Changmin’s finally met the beautiful and friendly Victoria Song, and he likes her.

He likes her a lot.

“Dude, you’re too obvious.” Kyuhyun tells him that night, rolling his eyes as he throws him a can of beer. “Everyone knows already. You might as well just ask her out and get it over with.”

“Everyone?” Changmin echoes, raising an eyebrow. His friend merely nods and shrugs his shoulders.

“Yes, everyone. From the kids in f(x) and all the way up to Kangta.” Kyuhyun smirks as they drink together. It’s not often that they have time to hang out, and that night, he simply didn’t want to hear his friend discreetly ask about his very pretty ‘other’ friend.

“Hell, even Yoona knows and she’s been holding a candle out for you for as long as I can remember.”

Changmin grunts at the mention and rolls his eyes, ignoring the fact that he’d almost choked on his beer. He catches Kyuhyun’s mischievous smirk and decides to ignore the underhanded suggestion.

(That is if there was one. Not that it’d be something he would ever admit to.)

“Maybe I’ll ask Vic out sometime.”

Kyuhyun says nothing more of the blatant ignorance and simply grins to himself.

* * *

Yoona drops by one day with a bag of burgers and distributes them all around the room. She’s wearing her costume from her drama; her hair pinned up in a half-ponytail and her skin paler under the studio lights. The smile on her face never falters, and a part of him is grateful for that.

“A little bird told me about your lady problems, sunbae.” She says to him as he plucks the wrapped sandwich off her hands. “And all I can really say is that you should just go for it. She’s going to say yes anyway, so why prolong the agony?”

“To whose agony are you referring to?”

Yoona shrugs absentmindedly, distracted somehow and for a moment Changmin feels as though he’s just made a huge mistake. She whispers the answer to his question more to herself that to him,

“Who knows.” _Who knows._

* * *

**Fact:** _He’s always known about her feelings._

Changmin isn’t stupid, nor is he blind. He just hadn’t thought about if there was a chance for him to feel the same way and he knows it’s wrong to not be clear about that. Yoona deserved to be told directly, honestly – but he couldn’t.

This was his problem.

Perhaps it’s because he didn’t know himself. Maybe.

It was the one thing he never could truly explain.

* * *

“She likes you too much.”

“Who does?”

“You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed at all, Changmin. I mean – she’s been leaving you those notes since 2002.”

“Ah. I didn’t know you knew about that.”

“Everyone knows. Exactly the way everyone knows about you and Miss Victoria.”

“That sounds like a scathing remark, Donghae.”

“Not really. … Well, maybe a little. I don’t really approve of you stringing our Yoona for so long.”

“I’ve never led her on.”

“No. Probably not consciously, but you are. And you can’t ignore that anymore.”

* * *

**Fact:** _Shim Changmin does, in fact, miss Im Yoona._

He doesn’t like to admit it. Not to her, not himself, not to anyone.

* * *

There’s a party for So Nyeo Shi Dae’s American advancement on the night Changmin finally asks his dream girl out. Kyuhyun and Minho are there sniggering beside him, and the rest of f(x) giggling as he spoke with the lovely Victoria. His tone is even when he confesses, and she’s extremely happy when she replies with a “ _Yes. I thought you’d never ask!_ ”.

For a moment, everything is picture perfect.

That is until Changmin meets Yoona’s eyes across the room, and she blinks away.

A part of him ignores the exchange, while the other part swears on the tears unshed in her eyes. And when she leaves the party hours before it’s finished, feigning a headache while avoiding his gaze… Changmin found that he couldn’t ignore the sinking feeling in his chest.

He couldn’t ignore _her_ , not anymore.

* * *

**Fact:** _The notes stop coming._

They pass each other out in the hall like any other day, and say nothing.

Changmin tries (and fails) to not let it bother him so much.

* * *

Changmin and Victoria get into a huge fight on their 26th day over a bento she made that he didn’t finish. It was a trivial thing, something he didn’t expect to be fighting about so early in the morning. They were yelling so loud that the news of their fight broke out faster in the company than neither wanted it to.

Minutes later, Victoria stomped off with quivering lip while he stayed behind to clear the damage. Once the explaining was done, he went his own way – passing by his locker and nearly missing the white note attached over its’ metal surface.

Changmin keeps Yoona’s (last) note without reading it. And it’s only hours later in his dorm, when So Nyeo Shi Dae’s already gone and flying towards the U.S., that he realizes he should have taken the time to do so.

_‘Fights never last between two people in love; and Victoria-unnie loves you. I know because…’_

The last words are blacked out, and Changmin struggles to breathe.

Five days later, he breaks up with Victoria and welcomes the sting on his cheek.

* * *

**Fact:** _There’s a box filled with post-it notes under his bed that he can’t seem to throw out._

It’s a little sad and tacky, sticking out from under his mattress like a sore thumb. Yunho complains about it on the day he lost a bet and had to clean their entire apartment. He is sitting on the couch, listening to a song ( _you know that my heart is aching_ _/how can you play dumb and smile like that?_ ) on his iPod when the older of the duo barged in with a broom on hand.

“Why don’t you just throw this out? You obviously don’t care enough to respond to any of these, so why keep them?”

Changmin throws him a glare instead of a reply, and his friend effectively shuts up.

* * *

“Hey. You’re back.”

“Hey. You’re actually talking to me.”

“Am I that bad?”

“Yeah, actually… you are.”

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay. Anyway, I have to go.”

“Right.”

“… It’s really nice to see you… Changmin.” _I missed you._

“You too, Yoona.” _I missed you._

* * *

He ignores it all. Her smile, her laugh, her eyes while they sparkle… he ignores the way her hair falls beyond her shoulders, the way the sweat trickles down her neck, the way her hand seems to fit so well into every leading man she’s paired up with and the way she ducks and looks away whenever their eyes meet from across the room.

He ignores Yoona because he doesn’t care. Yunho’s said so himself after all.

He doesn’t _care_.

 **Fact:** _Shim Changmin is a hypocrite._

* * *

“We need to talk.”

Changmin pulls her away from their friends before he can stop himself, his hand wrapped around her wrist as they enter one of the darkened practice rooms inside the SM Entertainment building. For once he is grateful that Kyuhyun and the others are too drunk to notice his absence and that Victoria had moved on from him and onto Zhoumi to care that he’d gone and pulled Yoona out of the party with him – but at the same time, he didn’t think it mattered.

“What do we have to talk about?” She pulls her hand away from him and walks over to the windows, peering down at the lights below.

He doesn’t know how to answer her and decides to say the first thing that came to mind, “We have to talk about everything.”

“And what’s everything?” Yoona asks, her tone soft as she turned her head back and looked at him. Somehow in the darkness, he can see himself in her eyes and he feels his stomach turn and twist again.

“You. Me. Us.”

“There is no ‘us’.”

The words cut through him harder, sharper than he’d imagined. “There could be.”

“Is that what you want?”

“I want a lot of things.”

She chuckles, the laugh not really reaching her eyes. “Ever the avoider,” she remarks, clicking her tongue at him in mock-disappointment. Changmin feels a little annoyed at her easy answer and retorts,

“I was serious about that. I do want a lot of things.”

“Well, do you want me?” Her question catches him off guard.

“I—”

“Don’t answer that, Changmin.” Yoona tells him, shaking her head. Her knuckles are white over the window’s edge and shivering. His hands moves on its’ own and covers hers. “We don’t have to talk. It’s okay… I’m already used to the silence, actually.”

“I’m a hypocrite.” He whispers into the air, warming the trembling fingers under his. She doesn’t pull away, and he’s not sure if he feels good or insecure about that. “But you already knew that, didn’t you?”

She shrugs. “We’re friends. Of course, I know.”

“We _used_ to be friends.” Changmin corrects her, “and I can’t ignore this anymore.”

“I’m seeing someone.” Yoona tells him suddenly, finally pulling away and effectively (albeit unconsciously) crushing him. “He’s around my age, a year older. He asked me out after one of those special stages for ‘The Boys’ and I have a great time with him whenever we go out.”

“Oh.”

“I think I might love him.” A tear runs down her cheek as she grins and pushes it away, breathing her words to him quietly, “Took me too long to get over you, right?”

They are silent for a moment, the seconds stretching on and into an eternity as the quiet in the room seemed to box them in immobile.

His heart is hollow suddenly, and the words fall of his lips without him meaning to:

“That’s good to hear.”

* * *

**Fact:** _It took Im Yoona six years and twenty-two days for her to get over loving Shim Changmin, while it took him six years and fifty-three days to realize that he, in fact, felt the same way._

It takes him only a second to know (the moment she’d gone and left) that he has missed his chance forever.

**Author's Note:**

> Dedicated to Yuri. Originally posted in Livejournal.


End file.
